I never said that! : message deceptiveness as a function of communicative responsibility

Abstract

Deception literature is replete with various approaches to understanding the ways in which deceptive messages vary. One commonality, however, is that various forms of deceptive messages are perceived as more or less deceptive. Little explanation has been put forth to explain this variance. Communicative Responsibility Theory, which suggests that the onus of message understanding may be more or less symmetrical between interactants, is invoked in an attempt to explain variations in perceptions of message deceptiveness. The present experiment induced various forms of deceptive messages and measured participant (N = 167) perceptions of deceptiveness as well as perceptions of interactants' communicative responsibility. Results indicated little to no relationship between the deceptive messages used in the study and communicative responsibility, but did reveal an overarching relationship between information manipulation and communicative responsibility. Potential inefficacy of the generated deceptive messages and implications of the findings are discussed.